Sunday, August 21, 2016

The National Iranian American Council (NIAC)[i], a lobbying organization founded and led by Iranian-Swedish national Dr. Trita Parsi[ii], and regarded by Tehran as its voice[iii] in Washington, DC, is doing its utmost to influence the outcome of the recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit’s order[iv] to the U.S. Department of State to comply by March 26, 2012 with a new review of the status of the Mojahedin e-Khalq (MEK) vis-a vis the 15 year old “terrorist” label applied to the Iranian anti-regime resistance group, nearly two years late for a similar order given by the Court to State in July 2010.

In an article published in the Thursday, March 15, 2012 edition of the Huffington Post, entitled “Money vs. Facts: The Mujahedin-e Khalq Is a Terrorist Organization”[v], NIAC’s Research Director[vi], Reza Marashi[vii], does his best to smear the MEK with a broad brush of the “terrorist” label. For those who are new to the subject, he might just get away with his slander as his ties to the State Department as a former Iran Desk officer[viii] would seem to put him in the know. However, a careful examination, will prove his unmasking, and show that his loyalty is to Tehran and not to this country.

Marashi begins his essay by saying that the MEK’s position on the terrorist list has been one of the few clear issues concerning Iran with which the State Department has had to deal. He declares that: “For nearly two decades and four presidential administrations, yearly reviews of the MEK’s terrorist designation have reconfirmed its rightful place on this most dubious list of 50 unsavory groups—most recently in January of this year.”[ix] Since the State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organization list has existed only since October 1997[x], and there have only been three presidents in that time span of 14½ years, Marashi is clearly bending the facts to distort the MEK’s image. The extent of Marashi’s deceit becomes clear when one reads Norman Kempster’s account of the formation of the list and the political reason behind the MEK’s inclusion therein in his report in The Los Angeles Times.[xi] Kempster put it this way: “One senior Clinton administration official said inclusion of the People's Moujahedeen was intended as a goodwill gesture to Tehran and its newly elected moderate president, Mohammad Khatami.”[xii] If the last 14½ years are any indication, based on the extent of co-operation achieved with the Islamic Republic of Iran in such places as Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, and the Palestinian territories—Gaza in particular—that goodwill gesture has proved to be a total failure. And yet Reza Marashi, like his boss Trita Parsi, would have us believe that dialogue and co-operation with Iran are just around the corner, especially if the U.S. keeps the MEK on the FTO! Reza jaan: have you been smoking opium with the likes of Ali Khamenei?

Marashi claims that he was involved in the 2006 and 2007 State Department review of the MEK’s terrorist designation. Through the good offices of U.S. Ambassador to the United Nation (a State Department office) John Bolton, I was invited for an individual meeting with members of the Iran Desk at the State Department in May 2006. Meeting with Henry Wooster, who incidentally still heads the Iran desk, it quickly became apparent that the Iran Desk was getting much of its information through surfing the net and that much of this “information” actually was disinformation supplied by a variety of websites[xiii] controlled by the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS=VEVAK), the Iranian version of the KGB. Careful analysis has unmasked the MOIS disinformation campaign[xiv], but neither Mr. Wooster nor his assistant seemed capable of fathoming the idea that the internet might be a great vehicle for the dissemination of disinformation, something VEVAK leaned from the KGB in its infancy. I would like to note that a senior Senate staffer who served the Senate Intelligence Committee stated in a meeting held in July 2005 that the committee knew that the terrorist charges against the MEK were bogus. It does seem strange that Marashi claims unanimity of opinion at the State Department concerning MEK’s “guilt” as terrorists when a former State Department official, Ambassador John Bolton has stated publically his support for the de-listing of the MEK.[xv]If one adds the testimony of Ambassador Bolton to that of a former FBI director, the former Homeland Security Secretary, two CIA directors, a National Security Director, a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—individuals who have seen the files on the MEK, and recalls that the High Court of the United Kingdom[xvi] and that of the European Union[xvii] both have ruled for the removal of the MEK from the respective proscribed lists, one wonders what is going on at the State Department. Add to that the strange fact that several former State Department employees have ended up on the board of pro-regime NIAC[xviii], and one wonders who it is that’s in bed with the real terrorists in Tehran?

But Marashi really veers away from reality when he writes[xix]: “Obama administration officials recently confirmed to NBC News that the MEK is being armed, trained and funded by the Israeli government to murder Iranian scientists.”[xx] As one commentator[xxi] to the report put it:

“We have a written and signed statement that claims no involvement by MEK and Israel in the bombings/assassinations and an anonymous source saying that the Iranian Government has evidence that this is going on and that the US Government is aware of it. I think that unless the anonymous folks want to step up into the spotlight with their evidence, they can't be believed. It very well could be the Iranian Government behind the attacks. Remember that so far most of the "scientists" that have been targeted are very low ranking individuals in their project - people in positions like the "Director of Procurement".”

Mr. Marashi: produce your sources and I will retract my comments; until then, a report that relies on the word of Mohammad Javad Larijani[xxii], is pure and simple propaganda for the enemy.

As for Marashi’s contention that “one of the appeals court judges wrote in her ruling, "the classified portion of the administrative record provides "substantial support" for [the Secretary of State's] determination that the PMOI [MEK] either continues to engage in terrorism or terrorist activity or retains the capability and intent to do so."”[xxiii], it seems strange that the majority of the court thought otherwise, requiring the State Department to review its case and reargue it, which until forced to do so by the March 5th order[xxiv], the State Department refused to do. Again, Mr. Marashi: produce documents or face a credibility gap. The same point applies to your lame excuse for the administration not producing evidence. A similar game was played by UK Foreign Minister Jack Straw and Whitehall until the UK High Court called their bluff. [xxv] In its November 30, 2007 review of the case, Lord Chief Judge Nicholas Phillips called the proscription of the MEK an act of perversity on the part of the British government.[xxvi]

There is one point upon which Marashi and I agree, and that is that the willingness of the MEK to move from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty should not be a part of the equation of determining its “terrorist” status, as has been suggested by Secretary Clinton recently[xxvii]. Marashi fears that this will help remove them from the FTO, a move he naturally opposes. For my part, I fear that the move to the site of Camp Liberty which is a glorified concentration camp[xxviii] will put the MEK members in greater physical danger than they already are.

Rabbi Dr. Daniel M. Zucker is founder and Chairman of the Board of Americans for Democracy in the Middle-East, a grassroots organization dedicated to teaching thepublic and its elected officials of the need to promote genuine democratic institutions throughout the Middle-East region as an antidote to the dangers posed by Islamic fundamentalism. He may be contacted at contact@ADME.ws.

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About Me

Rabbi Dr. Daniel M. Zucker founded Americans for Democracy in the Middle-East in 2005, an organization dedicated to teaching the public and our elected officials about the dangers of Islamic radical fundamentalism and the need to develop genuine democratic institutions in the region. Rabbi Zucker has organized and led briefings at the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate., and has spoken at human rights conferences at the United Nations, and delivered speeches at the 2005 National Conference for a Democratic, Secular Iran, at the 2006 Iranian National Convention in Washington, DC., and at the 2005 and 2006 Maryam Rajavi Iranian Freedom Convocations in Paris.
Rabbi Zucker is the author of over one hundred articles on the Middle-East.